So Deutsch!

Did you know?

Look who's speaking German!

Leonardo DiCaprio’s grandmother is German, that is why his middle name is Wilhelm. DiCaprio speaks German and in this interview he is talking about the town his grandmother lives in and what his favorite German dish is.

Sandra Bullock speaks German really well. Did you know that her family is German? She is here giving a speech after receiving a Bambi (a German movie award) and thanking her grandmother and the rest of her family for their continued support. She also tells us that she used to be a waitress, a cleaning lady and a dog stylist before becoming the Hollywood actress we know today.

More Famous German people:

Basketball pros Dirk Nowitski & Detlef Schrempf

Supermodels Heidi Klum and Claudia Schiffer

H. J. Heinz (Heinz ketchup) had German parents

Albert Einstein, famous physicist

And even Keanu Reeves can speak some German! Here he is reciting a German saying that translates to: "Tomorrow, tomorrow, just not today, is what lazy people say!"

Germans wrote some of your favorite books:

Cornelia Funke, the author of Inkheart & other children and young adult books

Michael Ende, the author of The Neverending Story

Curious George was written by Hans and Margret Rey, who grew up in Germany

The Brother Grimm (fairy tales)

Theodor Seuss Geisel (Dr. Seuss) grew up in a German-speaking family

L. Frank Baum, the author of The Wizard of Oz, had ancestors from Germany

Erich Kästner wrote Das doppelte Lottchen, basis for the movie The Parent Trap

So what are the facts....

Between 1949 and 1990 Germany was devided into two parts, the west was called Bundesrepublik Deutschland (BRD) and the east was called Deutsche Demokratische Republik (DDR)

German is the most widely spoken language in Europe with over 120,000,000 people speaking it

world wide more than 185 million people speak German

German is the official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxemburg, Lichtenstein. It is also one of the official languages in Belgium

42 million people in the U.S. have German ancestry, making German Americans the largest single heritage group in the U.S.

Germany is the biggest economical power in Europe

Germany is one of the world's largest exporters

18% of the world's books are published in German

German is the second-most commonly used scientific language

Deutschland

Germany's capital is Berlin

Germany is one of the few countries were Holocaust denial is a crime

The world's oldest zoo is in Vienna, Austria

The world's biggest zoo is in Berlin

The international calling code for Germany is 0049, the internet country code is .de